The Nays

Fourteen U.S. Senators voted AGAINST the Iraq war funding bill, including presidential wannabes Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

WASHINGTON -- Courting the anti-war constituency, Democratic presidential rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama both voted against legislation that pays for the Iraq war but lacks a timeline for troop withdrawal.

"I fully support our troops" but the measure "fails to compel the president to give our troops a new strategy in Iraq," said Clinton, a New York senator.

"Enough is enough," Obama, an Illinois senator, declared, adding that President Bush should not get "a blank check to continue down this same, disastrous path."

Their votes Thursday night continued a shift in position for the two presidential hopefuls, both of whom began the year shunning a deadline for a troop withdrawal.

Clinton and Obama are stumbling over themselves trying to appeal to the fringe Left base that rules the Democrat Party. I think John Edwards' current lead in Iowa has pushed Clinton and Obama to wander further from the center.

That's a gamble in the long term.

True, a candidate has to make it through the primaries first; but moving so far to the Left is dangerous as far as the general election goes.

Now that there are alternatives to the Old Media, Clinton and Obama aren't going to be able to manipulate the masses as easily as they could have years ago.

There are other sources of information now. The candidates' swing to the Left won't be forgotten even if they attempt to move back toward the center after securing the Democrat nomination.

Every move they make will be documented and discussed on radio. It will all be easily accessible on the Internet. Every faux pas and fake Southern drawl lives on You Tube.

The game is different now. The rules have changed.

Voting against funding for the troops may play well among the fringe radicals, but that's not the case when it comes to most Americans.

It's hard to believe the extent to which the Democrat candidates are willing to go to appease the hardcore Bush haters.

It's stunning.

The Democrats have really gone over the Left edge. Like their colleagues, Clinton and Obama aren't edging down a slippery slope into lib-ville, they are jumping off a cliff.

Roll Call

NAYs ---14
Boxer (D-CA)
Burr (R-NC)
Clinton (D-NY)
Coburn (R-OK)
Dodd (D-CT)
Enzi (R-WY)
Feingold (D-WI)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Leahy (D-VT)
Obama (D-IL)
Sanders (I-VT)
Whitehouse (D-RI)
Wyden (D-OR)

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Read " 'A Big Mistake' Vote Gives Bush His Iraq Money," from The Nation.